An archaeologist claims to have found a 16th century European coin in an Australian swamp, raising new questions about whether Britain's Captain James Cook was beaten to the east coast of the continent by the Spanish or Portuguese.
The silver coin, which is inscribed with the date 1597, was found by a group led by amateur archaeologist Greg Jefferys.
A colleague was digging in the sand with a machete when he found the badly corroded coin last month.
It was buried about 5cm in the ground in the middle of Eighteen Mile Swamp on North Stradbroke Island, Queensland.
If authenticated it will lend weight to the theory that Spanish or Portuguese navigators discovered Australia's east coast centuries before Captain Cook landed at Botany Bay in 1770.
Spanish ships explored the Pacific extensively from the early 1500s in search of gold, spices and the fabled Great Southern Land.